Not Quite Down for the Count
by Addy.is.not.a.Laddy
Summary: Evil's not over, but everyone likes to think it is. NOT HP/OC or DM/OC!
1. Chapter 1

Authour's Note: This is another attempt at the HP world. I'm not British, so please excuse mistakes in geography, slang, or British culture in general. This is post DH and don't worry, it's not an HP/OC fic. It's an OC/undisclosed canon character fic. :D Please don't let the fact that it has an OC dissuade you from reading. I really am proud of the start I have on this story.

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><p>Aysa woke up with a start, her mind racing in circles she didn't understand. She listened to the sound of rain outside her window as she tried to put her mind in order, but the endless circle of words made even less sense when she tried to understand it. She gave up trying and blinked a few times to get used to the early morning darkness.<p>

She looked around her room with a sigh and decided to distract herself from the nonsense in her mind. She flipped on her computer and sat down at it, playing mindless techno music until her mind calmed and she could just listen to the beat. She had graduated from a small Magic academy in Las Vegas not long ago, and even so, she found little she was able to do. She had no interest in pursuing a career in the Wizarding World, and the Muggle World was more interesting. Of course, that was assuming whe even knew what she wanted to do with her life, which she didn't.

She tapped her fingers absently to the beat of the music, and thought for a while. Her Magic Academy had taught her General Studies in Muggle Specialties that everyone in the States was required to take made it so that she had a decent GPA if she wanted to pursue a Muggle university.

Aysa had always wanted to study abroad since she had first started High School, but her mother hadn't let her. Her mother, Kimiko, had lived in Britain for a while when she was younger and told her daughter to wait until she was a few years older before trying to go study in Britian. Of course Aysa had taken that to be an outright no, so she was more than surprised when her mother's graduation present to her had been her mother telling her that she had arranged an assistant teaching position for Aysa in Britain. Well, it was more like Scotland, but they were close.

Plus, it seemed like all the turmoil and craziness that had been going on in Britain had ended hardly a month before Aysa graduated. Aysa was a little glad her mother had made her wait to go to Europe,especially since not long after Aysa had brought up wanting to go to the place her mother had lived for a few years, Europe had gone into chaos with freak hurricanes and bridges snapping like twigs.

Her mother was a math teacher at a Muggle school, even though she was a witch and could easily have gotten work behind the scenes at any of Vegas' shows to help with the special effects. Her mother preferred something quieter, and her father was actually her stepfather and a Muggle. He knew her mother was a witch, but her mother didn't do much besides housework with her magic anymore and the house was generally very peaceful.

Aysa paused her music for a moment to listen for possible disturbance to her parents, but heard silence. She sighed, looking at the time before shutting off her computer. It was four in the morning, so she pulled on some clothes and walked into her kitchen, making breakfast.

She was looking forward to her stayover in Britain, if only because it would get her out of the house and into somewhere new. She had exchanged web chat with the people she would be staying with a few months before she headed off to her assistant teaching position and they seemed really nice; a man named Vernon and a woman named Petunia. They had a son a year older than her that had just left home and they were looking forward to hosting her for a few months before she moved on to an assisting teaching position at a private school in Scotland.

She ate her breakfast as her mother came out of her room, bleary eyed.

"Why are you up so early, Ai?" Kimiko said sleepily.

"Why are _you_ up so early, mom?" Aysa countered. Her mother shook her head and sat heavily next to Aysa after pouring herself a cup of coffee.

"I couldn't sleep. My baby is leaving me today," she said, a hint of tears in her voice. Aysa smiled and patted her mother's shoulders.

"Not for a few hours." She sighed. "You said that all the details were arranged then?"

"Yes. I have a friend who lived in the UK, and she helped set up the whole thing." Her mother eyed her. "But I've only told you that about a hundred times already."

Aysa giggled. "I know. I just… I can't believe this is happening." She admitted.

Her mother hugged her after setting down her mug of coffee. "Lots to do today."

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><p>As the plane lifted off the tarmac, Aysa fought off tears. She knew she was leaving her heart behind in Las Vegas, in the dry sunny desert where she had grown up. She had done a bit of research on Britain and Scotland, and all she knew was that it was a lot more humid, the English was different, and there was a small wizarding population. Not that information on the wizarding population was on the Internet like the other information had been. The British wizards seemed not to associate with Muggle technology much, which Aysa thought was a shame.<p>

She looked out her window and saw the hazy outline of the strip slowly change as the plane gained altitude and distance. Before she had finished saying goodbye, it was gone. She let the tears slide down her face as she turned on her mini boombox, and put in her headphones. She planned on sleeping during as much of the journey as she could. It was a ten hour flight, and she had taken a sleeping pill so the journey would seem faster. She hated traveling becuse it went on forever. She would much rather sleep than have to sit for hours on end idly waiting to get somewhere.

When Aysa woke up, it was early afternoon and the plane was touching down. She navigated through the foreign airport, getting her passport stamped and her luggage picked up before pulling out her cell and checking to see if it had service. It did, and she called her exchange family. Petunia answered and told her they were already there and waiting for her, so she headed to the place where she was told they would be.

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><p>Petunia was an average woman, who had to be in her late thirties or early forties, and Vernon was a beefy man that looked to be about the same age. They greeted her with beaming smiles and asked her about the flight and her time in Britain so far. She smiled at them and answered their questions politely. As they spoke to her and she got used to the rhythm of their accents, it got easier to understand the different stresses in words and stuff. Aysa even tried saying a few words like she heard them saying them in hopes that she would get used to British English faster.<p>

Petunia commented on it by the time the car had stopped in the driveway, and they stepped out of the car in front of a small house.

"Have you lived in Britain before, Aysa?" she asked.

Aysa smiled. "No. I just don't want to sound like a stupid American. I know we American have a bad rep here." She knew she would probably have to adjust to British slang as well.

Petunia laughed. "Oh, it could be a lot worse. You could be French." Aysa laughed with her, and they walked into the house as Vernon insisted on carrying Aysa's luggage to her new room. It would only be her room for a short time, but it was hers all the same, so she quickly made herself at home while the middle aged couple left her to her own devices.

She could tell that this room had not been empty long, but it had a feel of disuse to it, like it wasn't used that much even by the original owner. It was clean and empty though, with sheets and blankets on the bed. Closing her door, Aysa pulled her wand from in her suitcase. She didn't use it much, but she didn't really feel like unpacking. Even though she had slept for so long, she was exhausted.

With a wave and a nonverbal spell, all of her clothes flew from her suitcase and into the closet onto hangers. She appraised the results before pulling out what looked like a toy suitcase from her large suitcase and enlarging it. She did the same with those clothes as well, but not before casting a glamour on them so that they didn't look like witch's robes.

She was done and lounging on her bed with her wand hidden in the pocket of one of her coats in her closet when she heard Petunia calling her down for a late lunch. She hadn't eaten since she had left Vegas, so she happily went downstairs and ate a light lunch of sandwiches.

Aysa made sure to ask Petunia about her family, and Petunia was only too happy to tell her about her only son. Dudley was eighteen, and attending Oxford. When Aysa asked if Petunia had any siblings she talked about a sister she had lost contact with, although Aysa could tell it was a tender subject, so she avoided it.

Her time with the Dursleys passed quickly. Aysa spent most of her time with Petunia, learning what she could about British culture, and spent the rest of her time either on the Internet, walking around the countryside with an effective notice-me-not charm on, or sitting in the library, reading books she had never even heard of in the states.

She was lounging in her room when she got seized by the urge to search the room for clues about the previous inhabitant. Dudley's room was the one next to hers, and it was still filled with a lot of his things, so she had to wonder who had lived in the room she currently resided in.

She found nothing until she had crawled under the bed and reached to the very back. Her fingers touched upon something small that turned out to be a photo when she pulled it out. But not just a photo. It moved. Aysa's pulse quickened for the first time since she had gotten to the Dursley's home. The Dursleys were Muggles. Aysa knew that for a fact, so she had to wonder what a moving photo was doing in the unused bedroom.

In the photo were three people. A boy with a shock of red hair, a girl with a bush of curly brown hair, and a green-eyed boy with plain messy black hair waved at the camera. The black haired boy wore glasses, and he had a curious scar on his forehead that Aysa took note of. The scar was strangely shaped, almost like a lightning bolt.

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><p>AN: Review! I can't know if you liked it otherwise, although I will understand if you are holding reservations until I have posted more fo the story. As this is only an introduction, I know that it will be hard to pass judgement on it just yet. _I'm going to get this BETA'd and fixed very soon. . I just wanted to post it while it was still fresh in my mind. _Scratch that. The amazing and wonderful Miriam1 has BETAed this chapter. The next few chapters are done, but they won't be posted until they've been fully BETAed, picked apart, and sewn back together. Thanks for reading!

Originally posted: 22:25 MST 7/20/11

Edited and reposted: 10:37 MST 8/3/11


	2. Chapter 2

Authour's Note: Not much to say about this chapter. Ehm. I know until I get more chapters I probably won't get more readers, so right now I'm just concentrating on writing. I'll prolly have half or more of the next chapter written by the time I post this one.

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><p>Aysa stared at the picture for a good five minutes before she decided she wanted to ask Petunia about it since Vernon was at work. Petunia was such a nice woman, Aysa was sure she'd explain it if she hinted she might know about magic.<p>

Aysa knew that she didn't really know Petunia and Vernon that well, and mostly all that Petunia talked about was how proud she was of her son for getting into the uni that he had. Vernon didn't talk much, honestly, but when he did it was to talk about his work or ask Petunia how Dudley was doing. Aysa supposed it was a normal family setting after all the children had left the house. Or, in this case, child, since Dudley had supposedly been their only child. Aysa shook her head slowly. She didn't know the Dursleys that well, so she could hardly judge them. Maybe the picture was from someone who had been staying with them like she was.

Aysa went down the stairs slowly, looking around to see if Petunia was in the house or outside. Petunia was at the stove, preparing lunch when Aysa came down, and when she heard her, Petunia smiled at her.

"Lunch is in a half an hour," she said pleasantly.

"Oh, that's cool," Aysa said politely, and smiled back. "I just had a quick question then. Who used to have my room?"

Petunia's face froze, and she said cooly "No one. That's always been a guest room."

Aysa tilted her head a bit, sensing that something was off. "Did someone own the house before you, then?" she asked curiously.

Petunia shook her head. "Why do you ask?" An edge had crept into her voice, and Aysa had grown a tad wary of the situation, but she continued, hoping nothing would happen.

"I just found a picture, and I was wondering who it belonged to." She handed Petunia the picture that had been in her back pocket. Petunia's eyes grew wide and panicky when she saw the picture, but it wasn't the surprise or curiosity of someone who didn't know magic.

Petunia looked at the picture, then at Aysa, and seemed at a loss as what to do or say, so Aysa tried to make the situation easier. "I know about magic, and stuff, so you don't have to worry about getting someone to wipe my memory."

Petunia looked up in surprise, her eyes searching for something about Aysa. Aysa was wearing some regular jeans and a tee, with her walkman plugged into one ear. Petunia took a shaky breath before handing the picture back to Aysa.

"My nephew, my sister's son used to live with us, but only for the summers. Do you have a sibling that is one of them?" Her voice was back to normal, but when she asked the question it, put Aysa on edge for some reason. Maybe it was the relief somehow bordering on accusation in Petunia's voice.

"Something like that. Used to live here? What about now?" Aysa dodged the question, not very neatly, and redirected.

Petunia shrugged. "He left. We lived elsewhere for a while, but since it's safe we came back here. Dudley left for college, so we decided to help Ms. Figg's friend's daughter out for a few months, and you came." She started talking about her sister then. Aysa could hear regret and resentment in the older woman's voice and it made her sad just to listen to it. Petunia ended "And then a madman went and killed her not sixteen or so years ago. I regret never apologizing to her for the horrible things I said." she paused a moment as if in realization and then said, "Don't tell Vernon I said any of this. He tries to forget the boy and all the bad things and the Wizarding World. We just want to live normal lives."

Aysa blinked for a bit, then decided to change the subject. She did it a lot, and right now she could sense that Petunia didn't want to talk about magic anymore. "Sure thing. What's for lunch then?"

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><p>As Aysa was collecting the mail, she caught a glimpse of thick paper, and peeked at the addressee. It was addressed to her, so she slid it from the stack and handed the rest to Petunia. She certainly hadn't expected to recieve mailwhile living on Privet Drive. She hadn't even known what her new address was going to be, so she hadn't told any of her friends. Petunia didn't seem to notice the letter in Aysa's hands, and Aysa was content to walk up the stairs to her room to read it. It was sealed with wax, which struck Aysa as odd, but she hardly glanced at the seal before pulling the letter open and grabbing the letter from inside.<p>

It was written in full cursive, but Aysa knew cursive. She did find it odd, however, than her full name was written. Only her parents and her best friend knew that name.

_Dear Aysa Teru Johnson,_

_I am pleased to welcome you to the Hogwarts staff. I hope that your journey from America wasn't too arduous, and that you will be at Hogwarts on September 1__st__. It is up to you whether to come by train at Platform 9 ¾ at King's Cross by eleven AM , or by floo. All of the supplies you may require for your new position are here as well, and I hope to see you soon._

_ Sincerely, _

_Minerva McGonagall, Headmistress._

Aysa shook her head at the letter. She didn't understand what floo meant, but she figured it to be a British slang word for car or subway. It was nearly the end of August though, so Aysa began packing her stuff by hand after rereading the letter a few times. It really didn't make much sense to have a platform called 9 ¾ at a train station, but who was she to decide what the British could and couldn't do? Besides, it was the only way she knew how to get there since she wasn't sure where to take the 'floo' to.

The last few weeks of her stay at the Dursleys were just as uneventful as the first few, minus finding the picture, which she had kept. Petunia hadn't even mentioned Magic again, and although she seemed to be warmer to Aysa somehow after that conversation, it wasn't mentioned again.

On September first, Aysa showed up at King's Cross and wandered through the crowds to platforms nine and ten. She was there an hour early but after wandering for a while, it was fifteen minutes until the time that the train was supposed to leave, and she was starting to feel like a cruel trick was being played on her. She stalked towards the post between platforms nine and ten, and leaned against the pillar roughly.

Or she would have, if she hadn't fallen through, and brought her suitcase with her. She landed in a heap, looking around dazedly. She certainly hadn't expected the barrier between the platforms to be anything less than solid. A few people nearby were giving her odd looks, but she stood and brushed off her skirt. She knew immediately that she was in the right place, but she also knew that her teaching assistant job would be nothing like what she had expected.

First of all, she had expected it to be at a muggle school, and the train in front of her couldn't possibly be bound for a muggle school. Everyone around was dressed oddly, like how American wizards might have dressed when the country was founded. There were a few people dressed normally, but they were a minority. Aysa took in everything around her with curiosity and amazement. It was nothing like America, or at least the small Wizarding bits that Aysa had seen.

Owls hooted from cages perched atop trunks on little carts. From the looks of things everyone used trunks, and not suitcases as Aysa would have expected. She was the odd one out, with her rolling suitcase trailing behind her as she boarded the train.

Trains weren't something she was very used to. Since she had grown up on the west coast of the United States, she had mostly just taken a car everywhere, and the trains that were around mostly only carted goods, not people. She had heard that one could take the train, but she never had, at least. This train was the definition of luxury, it was magic, and it was also very full. She got near the back of the train before finding an empty compartment and stowing her suitcase. Aysa was so out of her depth that she was beginning to panic.

The wizards in Britain were nothing like the ones in America, if the complete lack of suitcases or odd clothing was anything to judge by. Even as Aysa thought of it, she knew she was being silly, and tried to calm herself. She pulled a sleeping pill from her luggage and downed it dry, hoping to cope with train traveling the same way that she usually coped with traveling at all. She had seen so many new things and it was not even noon yet, and she needed a good nap.

She did manage to fall asleep, but to her dismay she woke after what could only have been a few hours. She was slowly waking up when she realized that she wasn't the only one in the compartment. She could hear voices around her of some friends bickering good-naturedly, and tried to get her bearings before sitting up from the leaning position she had against her window. The talking died when she moved, and she felt panic bubble up again from wherever it had been hiding. She wasn't familiar with anything here, but she tried to tamp down the panic. She was here to learn, so she had to be willing to take in new things. Her neck ached because of the odd position she had been sleeping in, with her head on her shoulder and her knees drawn to her chest, so she slid her legs to the ground and slowly stretched her neck out, rolling it first to one side, then the other, as she tried to decide what to do.

After she had stretched, she took a good look at the people in the compartment with her and was surprised that she recognized three of the inhabitants. They saw her recognition, and seemed to tense a bit. She ignored their tension though, because one of the girls was apologizing.

"I'm sorry if Harry and Ron's arguing woke you up." She said both apologetically and conversationally. "I'm Hermione, and this is Ron, Harry, Luna, Neville, Ginny, and Seamus." Pointing to each person in turn.

Aysa smiled. "I'm horrible with names, so I'll probably forget that, but it's nice to meet you. I'm Aysa." Aysa really was horrible with names. She could know someone for a month, and still not know their name, but only recognize their face.

Hermione's eyes widened when she heard Aysa speak. "Are you an American?" she asked with curiosity. Aysa nodded, and said nothing. She wasn't sure how to respond to the girl's open curiosity. Finally, Hermione asked "Are you an exchange student of some sort?" Aysa smiled, glad to have a topic she could talk about.

"Yeah, I think so. Not really sure what's going on right now, honestly. Britain is so different from America, I'm surprised by most everything here. What is Hogwarts like? Or, have you been there before?" Aysa felt silly for asking, but these students looked to be her age or even a bit older, so she figured they might have been assistant teachers like herself.

The black haired boy laughed. "We are heading back to complete our Seventh Year there. We're pretty familiar with it. It's pretty big, and there's loads of secret passageways. The staircases move, and loads of other stuff." The redheaded boy next to the black haired boy nodded. Aysa wished she hadn't already forgotten their names.

She eyed the rest of the people in the compartment who were listening intently, before turning to talk to the red haired boy that had been in the picture.

"Do you know Petunia and Vernon Dursley?"

He spluttered, and to her surprise both the bushy brown haired girl that had been talking to her and the black haired boy had their wands out and pointed at her. She jerked back so fast she banged her head on the wall behind her. The innocent curiosity they had had before was gone, replaced by wariness and suspicion. "How do you know them?" he finally responded. Aysa couldn't understand their reaction. One moment they had been perfectly friendly, and then the next they seemed about ready to kill her. For some reason, she knew that they possible could, as well. Something in their eyes was cold, and hard. The laughing facades had been replaced by faces that had seen horrible things Aysa couldn't understand. She felt a rush of fear, but tried to think her way through it.

Aysa wanted to defuse the situation as quickly as possible, so she went to pull out the picture, but saw that moving made the two who had their wands out even more anxious, and even most of the other people in the compartment had drawn their wands by this point. She put her hands in the air before slowly reaching into her suitcase and snagging the picture she had found. She had looked at the picture a lot in the past few weeks, when she was bored of being at the library, or of window shopping, or just plain bored. She knew the faces in the picture by heart. Just as slowly as she had reached for her suitcase, she handed the picture to the redheaded boy.

"I lived with them during the summer until now. I found this under the bed I was sleeping on. I asked Petunia about it and she said that it belonged to her sister's son." Now that Aysa thought about it, Petunia had never mentioned her nephew's name.

The redhead guffawed, and the rest of the compartment lowered their wands slightly. "_Me_? You thought _I_ was related to those muggles?" His reaction made Aysa's face turn red, and she ducked her head a bit trying to hide her embarrassment. The way he said it had almost been insulting, and she felt like she might have been missing something. The black haired boy and the bushy haired girl lowered their wands, though not completely, and started to laugh as well. Aysa noted however that the bushy haired girl was eyeing the picture with an almost worried look on her face.

She turned to the black haired boy instead, and tried to remember his name. When she was in an embarrasing situation, she used her favorite conversational tactic and tried to change the subject. "Are you Ron, then?" she asked. He gave her an odd look, and she tried to to flush even more.

"I'm Harry. Harry Potter." He said, and seemed to cringe away from whatever reaction he expected from her. She sat silently for a moment, trying to commit the name to memory. It frustrated her that she could remember facts and words mentioned once, but names were like eels, slipping out of her grasp. She quickly gave up.

"Oh. I'm sorry. I'll probably forget that. I'm horrible with names. I just wanted to ask where you got that odd scar from." She apparently hadn't reacted like he had expected, and Aysa saw suspicion from everyone in the compartment now except a strange blonde girl who had never even taken out her wand and was absently flipping through a magazine. Aysa felt a little hurt that everyone was suspecting her of something, but she couldn't possibly imagine what she had done. She had only brought out a picture, and then tried to strike up a conversation with the black haired boy. His name started with an H or something.

The redheaded boy was the one that broke the awkward silence that Aysa knew was her own fault. She had been about to apologize for asking, figuring it was probably personal.

"Get off it!" he said, and his tone wasn't friendly. "First you claim not to know Harry's name, and then you wonder where his scar came from. You must be mental, or have lived under a rock your entire life." The hurt that Aysa had been hiding burst out, and Aysa shook her head, trying to make sense of what was going on. It was like she was supposed to read their minds to know their names and histories or something.

Aysa looked around and saw that almost everyone in the compartment agreed with his words. She felt like she might cry. "Get off what? I've only met him today. I'm sorry I can't read minds like you crazy British wizards!" and she stood, fleeing from the compartment with tears running down her face. She didn't know where she was running to, but she saw curious faces peek at her from many of the compartments before she gave up on trying to find a new one to hide in. From the moment that she had woken up, they had treated her like some sort of spy or something, and then accused her of either being crazy, or a liar. She crouched in the hall space and cried there, wondering why on earth she had decided coming to Britain might be a good idea.

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><p>AN: Yeah. I'm working on the 4th and 5th chapters of this now. I would have posted sooner, but I didn't for two reasons. The interest in this fic seems to be negligible, and I should have expected that since it has an OC in it, and because I started fall term here at my uni, so time kind of got away from me! Again, the beautiful Miriam1 BETAed this little monster.

I'll be taking up arms for NaNoWriMo in less than a month. So, while the fic may still be updated, I'm not probably going to be writing any new chapters at that time. I'll simply be working on NaNo and maybe posting some of the NQDftC chapters I already have written.


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